Page 38 - Art First: Helen MacAlister: The Glamour of Backwardness

AF HM catalogue 2023 PRINT.qxp_Layout 1 15/06/2023 17:37 Page 36

The glamour of backwardness

Glamour may comprise the Gaelic glac — to seize, to lay hold of, to fascinate + mor — great.

‘As for ‘backwardness’, this was until around the middle of the century the condition attributed
by Her Majesty’s subjects to most of the rest of the world. It meant those incapable of industry
and democracy, or still on the long uphill road of modernisation. A summit or advance-party view,
it looked back with inevitable condescension to the treacherous lower slopes of picturesque

superstition and back-sliding ignorance.

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The glamour of this backwardness is its legitimation through icons of continuity and reassurance:..’

Glamour could also be derived from glimmer or glitter — ‘A false lustre, a charm on the eyes’.

All to which could be added the Scots tinsel — loss, damage by loss or harm, perdition, damnation,
forfeiture of a thing.

The St John’s nut — a double hazelnut, supposed to be a charm against witchcraft — responds to the title.

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The Enchanted Glass — Tom Nairn, (The Glamour of Backwardness)

From a set of thirteen text drawings, the first, illustrated on the right, gives the exhibition its title.
The remaining twelve drawings are listed on the following pages, where possible using the artist’s
words and references as she has drawn them. They are closely linked to the paintings, which are
illustrated in this catalogue

All pencil on paper, 42 x 59.4 cm (a2)